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Oh no ! The temperature’s climbing up and there’s coolant dripping out of the engine bay. Now is that a cat screaming under the bonnet or is time to change the water pump ???
Well it was Friday afternoon and I thought it was about time to order the water pump so a quick call to Highgate SAAB, and my water pump was on its way. I would not have believed it but come Saturday morning the sun was shinning and the water pump arrived all neatly packaged and just waiting to be put in.
Before you start get a box to throw all the bits you remove into so they don’t get lost.
First things first - bonnet up and battery disconnected (I don’t usually bother only when you’re work involves removing the alternator it’s for the best really.
The cross support bracket between the front panel and the inner wing will get in the way so remove that first and give yourself some room.
It’s only a crosshead bolt at the grill end and a nut and bolt at the other. Loosen the top adjustment nut for fan belt tension, and remove the belt.
Take the nut and bolt right off and loosen the nut the engine end so that the bracket can be swung well out of the way. Undo the bottom bolt for the alternator and put it and the alternator in your box.
Next remove the alternator bracket. I also removed the bracket that goes between the manifold and the alternator bracket.
To assist access even more I removed the spark plug lead and plug nearest the front of the engine.
Assuming that you’ve probably have lost most of your coolant - I’ll skip the drain down the coolant system! The next tricky part is removing the hoses around the water pump. You don’t need to remove the big bottom hose but the two coming out of the back of the pump plate will need to be removed.
I couldn’t find a way of getting to all the bolts that hold the water pump in unless I did that - it was still difficult even then.
The pump is held onto the pump plate buy 5 bolts (10mm head, I think). I used various combinations of drive sizes to get at the back bolts - 3/8 drive being very useful.
Take pump off and inspect - mine had a lot of play in the bearing and it sounded very crunchy.
Now that the pump is off clean the pump plate very carefully so that the new gasket will seal. I used Blue Hylomer on both sides of the gasket in order to even more sure of preventing leaks. It also tends to hold the pump in position whilst you align it and put the 5 bolts back in.
I cleaned all the bolts that I was putting back in and greased them to aid future removal.
As they say in the books refit all items in reverse order to put back together.
Replace coolant with appropriate mix of water and antifreeze. Run up the engine - check for leaks. Remember to vent the water system at the back of the heater fan housing. Whilst the engine is warming up top up the system at the radiator and make sure that the water is at the correct level in the expansion bottle.
The job took me a couple of hours to get the pump off and about 30 minutes to put back together - not quick but I did have to find all my tools after moving house and mend a 3/8 racket drive. But then life is never simple is it?
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